Why even bother setting up Google authorship?
Well here’s two very good reasons why you should.
1) Setting up Google authorship is just another way of establishing your online presence in the serps. It is another variable in helping to establish trust with Google as an author.
Creating trust helps with rankings.
2) Your picture shows up in Google’s search results, which helps to push brand recognition and also attract click through’s on your listings as shown below.
Here are the steps:
Step 1) Set up your personal Google+ account. If you have not yet done that, then create an account first. Go to https://plus.google.com/. Here’s an example of a Google+ profile.
Step 2) Enable an author byline on the posts of your WordPress blog. Be sure that the name you will be using in your WordPress blog is the same with what you have in your Google+ profile.
The author byline is set to default (that is your username in your WordPress account) unless you enter a different name in the “Display name publicly as” option under your profile personal options.
Most themes show the author byline in the post metadata – it can be shown below the post or above the post depending on the theme.
Step 3) Have a verified email address on the same domain with your WordPress blog. Here’s an example.
Step 4) If you are not signed in to your Google+ account, then you need to Sign in first. Then after that, go to https://plus.google.com/authorship.
Step 5) In the Sign up form, enter your email address (the one which has the same domain with your WordPress blog) and click on the “Signup for Authorship” button.
Step 6) Google will send you an email to verify your authorship, just click on the verification link found in that email and then you’re good to go.
Step 7) Go to Structured Data Testing Tool: http://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/richsnippets, enter your WordPress blog’s url and click on the “Preview” button. This will check if you have properly set up your Google authorship.
